This is an adaptation of the Julian Barnes novel.

Webster (Jim Broadbent) has a camera shop and receives a letter. The letter is from a woman now dead and it speaks of the diary of a friend of his youth. This was a friend who killed himself, for who knows what reason, and Webster has always felt that he was to blame. He tries to obtain the diary – he wants answers, needs to lance his guilt.

It is a decent film with fine performances from Broadbent, Harriet Walter and Charlotte Rampling, and it flits deftly from the past to the present, the present to the past (on entering a pub, the youthful Webster hears a burst of Nick Drake). Yet you have to say that Webster gets off a little too lightly. There is a minor irritation of conscience when remembering his former friend’s death. Some ointment is applied – a warm conversation with his ex-wife – and, wonder of wonders, all is well.